Feeling Blue: A Brief History of a Color
Introduction
Many of us take seeing color for granted. Can you imagine a time when the perception of a color could be non existent? Or that first moment in time when humans had the ability to replicate the colors around them with resources at their disposal? How do humans manifest color in physical form? What does color mean to us through time given new technology?
I have always been deeply fascinated how humans have utilized color, e.g. to indicate concepts of identity, class, cultural importance, beauty, and communication. In order to greater understand the history of the human evolution of color perception and utilization, I targeted one color, blue, to track this journey.
Materials
I utilized the open-source software TimelineJS, provided by Knight Lab, to visualize key milestones in the development of the color blue (and many shades there of) throughout time. The software enables a person with less coding experience to easily transform data- in the forms of text, image links, video links, and even Google Maps- into a linear and visual interactive timeline. Those with more experience with javascript and other programmatic languages have the option to dive deeper into functionality and customization options.
A templated Google spreadsheet provides the structure and bridge in which data is entered and then transformed to the timeline output. Downloading the template was very easy with each column header providing instruction on how the data should be entered in to the table. I also appreciated the option to apply HTML and CSS styling to individual cells and words to allow for added impact to the textual output.
A templated Google spreadsheet provides the structure and bridge in which data is entered and then transformed to the timeline output. Downloading the template was very easy with each column header providing instruction on how the data should be entered in to the table. I also appreciated the option to apply HTML and CSS styling to individual cells and words to allow for added impact to the textual output.
Another resource that I leveraged to help complete the story of color perception was an online gallery of color names with their corresponding hex codes and swatch example.
Additionally a handful of online resources like wikis, blogposts, museum online collection data, and research articles were leveraged to attempt to piece together the extensive (but in no way exhaustive) history of blue.
Methods
Tackling the history of a color and also being able to articulate the idea of color perception is very challenging. One of the ways I attempted to draw comparisons of a physical object(s) to conceptual understanding of how color is represented, is through images of the objects themselves (in that particular color) displayed with their respective pigments in their raw form. To draw further connections to color representation and perception in the digital realm, I chose to juxtapose the images of objects and pigments to their hexadecimal color formats, which is a 6-digit integer code that represents different amounts of red, green, and blue. This code then provides a unique value of color that our eyes can identify through various digital displays.
Results
Ultimately, I was very surprised to learn of the many ingenious ways humans leveraged chemistry, biology, and artistic expression to curate and create a colorful environment, with specific colors (of just blue!) to signify greater meaning in their lives. Humans were and are very resourceful when it comes to the creation and utilization of color in materials, tools, and objects to communicate cultural significance (like Egyptian Blue), class (use of rare and labor-intensive pigments, like Ultramarine), and identity (a single blue created by and named for an artist, like International Klein Blue).
Perception of blue changes from individual to individual and even from platform to platform, which was made very evident by the juxtaposition of hex colors and images of pigments. The differences from images to hex color backgrounds rarely ever “matched” exactly with the images of the same color represented in the objects. It really gave me to pause to think about and question the meaning of the unique value any one color could possess.
Egyptian Blue: Figure of lion, ca. 1981-1640 B.C.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art | OA Public Domain
A new blue: YlnMn blue is the most recent blue to be created in 200 years by Oregon State University professor Mas Subramanian and his student.
Image courtesy of Mas Subramanian via Wikimedia Commons | Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0
Reflection
At the conclusion of this study I ended up with more questions than answers: There are so many shades of blue. How does one ever make the call to decide which blue should represent key epochs? What about those that have a physical limitation to see color like colorblindness, how should that factor into our choices of color in visualizations?
If I had additional time I would like to dive deeper into the other layers of color perception, like the connection to emotions (i.e. how colors evoke or could alter emotional states of being). Color as a word has also entered our various languages and that would be another area of interest I would like to pursue. Moving on to other colors in the spectrum would also be on the list.
I found that the timeline visualization was limiting to fully represent the arc and history of a particular color. Color pigment discoveries seemed to happen all other the world simultaneously by way of the raw materials surrounding those particular cultures and the cultural significance manifestations through objects, art, and beauty. The same colors also peaked at various times for different civilizations at different time periods.
At the present, I am still trying to wrap my head around the assertion that humans didn’t see blue until 6,000 years ago, even with the thought of the blue skies up above…. who knows what other colors humans will create (or see) next?
References
Indigo dye. (2022). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Indigo_dye&oldid=1065477095
International Klein Blue. (2022). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=International_Klein_Blue&oldid=1065148157Mangla, R. (2015, June 8).
Pigment Stories: Ultramarine Blue and French Ultramarine. (2019, November 5). Jackson’s Art Blog. https://www.jacksonsart.com/blog/2019/11/05/the-story-of-ultramarine-blue-and-french-ultramarine/
True Blue. The Paris Review. https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/06/08/true-blue/
The Color Blue: History, Science, Facts | Dunn Edwards Paints. (n.d.). Dunn-Edwards., from https://www.dunnedwards.com/colors/specs/posts/color-blue-history
The History of the Color Blue: From Ancient Egypt to the Latest Scientific Discoveries. (2018, February 12). My Modern Met. https://mymodernmet.com/shades-of-blue-color-history/
Timeline JS. (n.d.). Timeline JS. https://timeline.knightlab.com/
Yves Klein. (2021). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Yves_Klein&oldid=1061811989
Yves Klein. Blue Monochrome. 1961 | MoMA. (n.d.). The Museum of Modern Art., from https://www.moma.org/collection/works/80103